The Ten Plagues of East Jerusalem

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The revolution unfolding on Cairo’s streets should raise the alarm in Jerusalem too. Like the Egyptians and the Tunisians, the Arabs of East Jerusalem have been humiliated and trampled into the dust for years under a tyrannical regime. Here too, patience is running out. The winds in East Jerusalem are the same ones blowing through the Cairo streets, and will ultimately bring down the regime that anticipated never-ending rule.

The Israeli government seems unaware of events in the city’s eastern half. It’s not really interested, and is also enslaved in the doctrine imported from the Occupied Territories – best to keep them on a short leash so they don’t get unruly and dare to demand national rights, God forbid. The entity that’s responsible for East Jerusalem today is the General Security Services – the Shabak – which rules in an iron-handed triumvirate together with the police and the Border Police. Together they decide what the Arabs may and may not request.

City Hall is a bit-player, reacting to events with obvious unwillingness, and making half-hearted attempts to solve problems here and there, in the patchwork method. Israel’s control over East Jerusalem is based on truncheons and bribery – and they won’t last for ever. They didn’t work for countries with Muslim regimes, all the more so when the rulers are Jewish. A few experts say that an uprising in East Jerusalem is unlikely, since the Arabs have got something to lose – National Insurance allowances and the blue-covered ID cards that can open some  doors. But they’re living in the past. More and more Arabs say openly that their daily humiliations are not worth the NII benefits. Many have decided that even if Israeli benefits are better than conditions in the Palestinian Authority, it’s not necessarily a package deal – social benefits in return for humiliation. They know it’s not a divine decree that they must remain fourth-class citizens.

It’s not hard to see the undercurrents of rage on East Jerusalem’s street. You just have to look into people’s eyes to realize that something major is going on, something inflammable. It’s better to stop for a moment and look at the processes that are so intolerable for East Jerusalem residents, before it’s too late. Because even if things erupt, and tanks drive into East Jerusalem, Cairo has shown us that armor can withstand the people’s rage, when things are just too much.

The inventory list of things that infuriate East Jerusalem residents can be summed up in ten points – let’s call them The Ten Plagues of East Jerusalem – and they’re not listed here by severity.

The huge difficulties entailed in obtaining a building permit and building lawfully is the First Plague. Obstacles have piled up for years – proving ownership, lacking infrastructures, low construction percentages – and all have worsened with the migration of scores of families who crossed the Separation Wall to the “right side” to avoid losing their blue I.D. cards.

The separation wall is the Second Plague. It divides families, relatives and dear ones, and makes any trip to the Occupied Territories a “journey into the unknown’. No one can predict how long it will take to get to the destination or to return from it. It all depends on the mood of the soldier at the checkpoint.

Plague Three is the Interior Ministry, which pursues and confiscate ID cards from people it believes are living beyond the municipal jurisdiction. Many discover one day that their citizenship has been revoked, with no previous warning. They must then launch a legal battle that requires immense resources.

The Fourth Plague – the Interior Ministry’s prevention of East Jerusalem residents from reuniting with their families or wives from the Occupied Territories. They must live an almost underground existence in Jerusalem, without the necessary papers, for fear of arrest.

The Fifth Plague – the settlers who long ago lost any self-control and are taking control of every scrap of land in East Jerusalem. Their aggression is increasing, with the recent rumors that a peace process is progressing. They have no compunction about evicting whole families from their homes, and cast fear where ever they go.

The Sixth Plague, arguably the harshest, is the destruction of homes built without the proper licenses. It is a threat to thousands of families, not because the municipality can destroy them all, but because none of the thousands of families who’ve received demolition orders know when the bulldozer will arrive to demolish their house.  In this situation, families live on borrowed time, and their stress is evident.

Plague Seven is the economic situation that is causing havoc in East Jerusalem, dragging 70% of the families in East Jerusalem below the poverty line. When there’s no perspective for improvement, people have little to lose.

Plague Eight – the Border Police and their degrading attitude. It has become an uncontrollable force, violent and hot-headed, that injures the deepest sensitivities of East Jerusalem residents.

The Ninth Plague – the archaeological excavations that the state is performing near the Temple Mount. The dig is considered an attempt to penetrate beneath the Haram al-Sharif and to topple the mosques. Even if this is not the intention, the very concern or a rumor is enough to ignite a conflagration.

The Tenth Plague is the atrocious level of municipal services, from garbage collection to the education system, which renders East Jerusalem’s inferior status permanent. And every time Arab citizens cross to the western part of the city and see the vast divide between their own standard of living and that of their Jewish neighbours, it is seared into their awareness.

All these reasons, singly or jointly, will ignite a future conflagration. How long can people be kept humiliated? Oppression has its own dynamic – it sets off resistance that needs a strong hand, which in turn generates more resistance, and so on and so on, until the breaking-point where everything implodes. The winning method of the “carrot and the stick” on which Israeli control of East Jerusalem is based, is disintegrating. The stick is hitting too hard, and the “carrots” are losing their effect. The end-of-the-season sales are over, no one’s selling their self-respect for a mess of pottage. The checks and balances system has kept going for 42 years, but is now worn-out – and the abyss awaits. This is not meant to be a prophecy of doom, but a flashing warning light before disintegration.

Most Israelis prefer to ignore events in their backyard, but the city’s leaders are not entitled to bury their heads in the sand. They would do well to rethink their policies before the tsunami that’s sweeping through the whole Arab world, washes over us too.